


Returning

by ardellian



Category: Fallen Hero Series - Malin Rydén
Genre: M/M, canon typical angst and self-loathing, character exploration
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-07
Updated: 2020-06-06
Packaged: 2021-03-03 20:27:54
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,899
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24571546
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ardellian/pseuds/ardellian
Summary: Sidestep returns to Los Diablos.
Relationships: Ortega/Sidestep (Fallen Hero)
Comments: 13
Kudos: 38





	1. Chapter 1

Los Diablos. 

Still here. 

You let yourself get carried along with the crowd - an incessant river of sound and thoughts that pulls you down the boulevard. Your hip hurts, and your feet feel strange, like tender misshapen lumps at the end of your legs - but you don’t care. They’ll carry you. They have to.

Didn’t you use to find this comforting? A crowd to get lost in?

You’re not lost, though. You know where this boulevard goes. You know that if you continue straight ahead you only need to make a single right turn and then it’s another straight line to the Rangers’ headquarters. You know you could walk from here to your old apartment. A forty minute walk or so - probably longer now, this body doesn’t really work the way it used to - and you could stand outside your door. 

You try to remember what it looked like and it makes your head hurt. 

You wonder who lives there now. 

What did they do with your things? Burn it all?

You turn the opposite direction - towards the ocean. You can't see it from here, just the soft yellow of smog mixing with the low clouds. 

Someone bumps into you and is annoyed that you didn’t swerve fast enough to avoid them. A sudden flash of anger threatens to choke you, and your not sure if you’re angry at the man in the suit, or at yourself and your wrecked body and useless feet. Maybe both. 

It settles in uncomfortably in your esophagus, like a pill swallowed without liquid. Anger. _Hate_. You hate these people. You hate them for not seeing you, for not _noticing_. Blind. Stupid. Ignorant. You hate them for what they’d do if they did see you - if they knew what you were. 

The morsel of freedom you had, and you spent it protecting these people. Trying to keep them _safe_.

You look at the faces of the people passing by, and wonder if you ever saved any of them. Her, that woman in the yellow skirt - did she live here during the Nanosurge? That man - might have been a hostage, a hapless victim. All of them - victims. 

One of them looks at you, and she shies back, her expression betraying exactly what she thinks - _Oh God, who is that, what’s wrong with him - he looks sick - he looks dangerous_. Her mind is like a little snow globe, full of stupid little decorative thoughts - before you’ve really have time to reflect on it you’ve smashed it, reached in and ripped out the memory of your face and crushed it to dust. 

She stumbles, falling into another pedestrian, clear liquid full of snowflakes spilling out everywhere. 

You feel, deep in your gut, something warm and heavy, and you smile. You flex your hands, roll your shoulders. You’re not helpless anymore. 

Not trapped. 

Fuck, a part of you wants to go back there. You shiver. If you get back there, find _them_ , you could do much worse than just smash someone’s perceptions for a few seconds. You let your mind roam over the crowd, feeling the buzz of dozens of minds. You feel it; like flexing a muscle that has fallen asleep. A strange tingle, telling you that there’s so much more here. Much more than you were used to. Where you used to have a finger to poke and prod the world with, now you have an arm. A hand.

A hand you could form into a fist. 

For one blissful minute you imagine the look on their faces, detached curiosity replaced with naked terror - and then your anxiety reminds you that you’re a broken wreck that can hardly walk because you haven’t used your legs in... 

Years? 

You don’t know exactly how long it’s been. 

Los Diablos looks the same. But it must have been years. You've seen the scars on your hip, remember the way your leg was broken. All the scars - you look down at your hands. Faint pink, not angry red. 

You feel the righteous anger dissipate and turn into nausea. How much time have you lost?

Up ahead is a newspaper stand; you aim towards it, planning to snatch a newspaper, to get a date. 

But you don’t. 

You stop. Stare. 

There’s a face you know, looking back at you from that stand. A smile. Blue and white and bronze skin and in big letters: _15 years - Charge looks back on his career._

Fifteen years. His smile looks strange, and you realize it’s because he hasn’t shaved properly - he has a mustache. Fifteen years?

No, that’s...

_No_. Charge was in the Rangers before you met. For... For how long? How long did you know him? Do you remember? 

You snatch the magazine from the stand, wiping your presence from the cashier’s mind, and you stare at his face. 

Ricardo Ortega smiles up at you, his hair carefully styled, his face perfectly edited. They’ve removed the scar across the bridge of his nose, even. Or maybe it faded? 

Someone walks into you, because you aren’t watching where you’re going - annoyed, you push them all away, giving yourself an aura of _do-not-go-here_.

Your mouth feels like it’s covered in a film of something raw and dirty - you flip open the magazine. 

He’s got a full six pages. The biggest picture is an artfully lit one where he’s got lightning arcing between his palms. Faked, probably. There’s a portrait on the second spread, he’s looking to the side and laughing, seems to be wearing civilian clothes.

You can’t look at that. 

_Fifteen Years in the Line of Fire_ , says the headline. In italics underneath, _Charge joined the Rangers in 2002, two months after he turned twenty. On his 35th birthday, he speaks out about his career, his years as Marshal, and his plans for the future._

Your brain, which is roaring like a forest fire and producing the same amount of useful information, takes its time processing the words.

Fifteen years. Since 2002. 2002 plus ten is 2012 plus five is 2017. Ricardo Ortega just turned thirty five. You remember celebrating his thirtieth. You bought him reading glasses and a cane. Which he spent the rest of the party trying to hit you with.

_I’m not actually old, he’d said. I really don’t understand why you’re being such an ass about this._

_You’d laughed at him. Twirled his hair around your fingers. Because his head was on your shoulder. He was rubbing his nose against your neck._

_You’d said something. Something you can’t..._

_And then..._

No. You take the memory and you push it away, down; out; gone. Turn your mind to the text. 

_Charge arrives exactly fifteen fashionable minutes late, hounded into the reception room by an assistant that is laughing at something he just said. He’s grinning at her, and then at me, taking my hand and shaking it vigorously._

You’ve read so many of these, haven’t you? Dozens of interviews where the journalist falls for the smile, the jokes, the charisma. You’ve seen him do it once, and you can put the thoughts of that girl straight into this journalist’s head; _This is so much easier than I thought. I can’t believe he’s really this nice. Oh god, I hope I’m not blushing._

You skim through a bunch of nonsense, but then...

_In April 2013, a chemical agent was released in Los Diablos, which caused a temporary madness in all exposed. The Rangers were brought in to deal with the issue quickly, before it was clear what the cause was. While the details are not known to the public, Marshal Charge was leading three other people that day - the current Marshal, Steel, the Ranger Anathema, and Sidestep, an independent hero and a frequent partner. Two of them died._

_It must have been hard losing people you were responsible for, I say, trying to be respectful._

_They were my friends, Charge says. Close friends. And the decisions I made cost them their lives. I’m going to regret that for the rest of my life._

_He sighs deeply before continuing._

_There’s no villain to blame, no one who did this to me; to them. I didn’t take it seriously enough. And they died. They were my team, they trusted me, and I let them down._

You’ve stopped in the middle of the street, reading the text with a frantic urgency. Waiting for the sucker punch. 

_But Sidestep wasn’t on the team. When I mention this, Charge shakes his head and almost gets angry._

_He was, he says. He wasn’t a Ranger, not officially, but I worked with him for five years. Sidestep was my partner, my best friend, and one of the best people I’ve ever known. Not a day goes by when I don’t miss him. The way he speaks closes the topic for further discussion._

That’s it. The interview goes on; Charge speaks about Marshal Hood, about new members of the team whose name you don’t recognize, and then there’s a lengthy section at the end where he’s being coy about his current relationship status with some woman you don’t know - there’s no further mention of you. 

Nothing. 

You don’t know what you expected. You read the paragraphs over and over again. _...almost gets angry. The way he speaks closes the topic for further discussion._ He must know. It’s just a front for the media. You’d been sure they’d let everyone know - but really, why would they - wouldn’t it just reflect badly on them? That you escaped in the first place. 

You try to imagine him, from the sparse words of the reporter. Almost gets angry. Closes the discussion. But those words... 

They _must_ have told him. You know they told him, that’s why he never came for you - they faked your death and he let them - he left you there - he...

What if he thinks you died?

You remember the staircase - following him. He was there. He knows what happened. 

You fell. You remember falling - don’t you? He was there - he... 

_A shadow across the floor._

_You think you’re screaming._

The urge to throw up is sudden and overwhelming and you barely manage to stumble of the sidewalk and into an alley before you do. The newspaper falls on the ground, swept away into the street by careless feet. 

You squeeze your eyes shut and bite your lip until it bleeds. 

You’re here. You’re walking down the boulevard and you’re free now. You got away.

You didn’t die. 

As you stumble through the streets, eventually finding your way to a park where you can sit and rest your swollen feet, the thought keeps ambushing you. 

What if he doesn’t know you’re alive? 


	2. Chapter 2

You hide yourself away in the park as the sun sets, try to sleep. Maybe you do, maybe you don’t, you’re not sure. Your body feels exhausted, but you keep waking up in a cold sweat, panicked, thinking you’re back there. You’re not. 

_You’re not._

And when the sun rises again you get on a bus, and you go towards the Ranger’s headquarters. It’s not hard to find, still where it used to be. Five years ago. 

You get off the bus. 

You look at the building across the street. 

No one will be there yet - it’s barely five in the morning. 

Could you go in? No one would recognize you like this. If they would remember you at all. You would get thrown out, assumed to be just another crazy person living on the street. 

_I swear, I am Sidestep, just let me talk to Charge, please!_

You grimace. 

You could _make_ them let you in. Walk straight up to his office and knock on the door. 

_Surprise! Remember me?_

But _Steel’s_ the Marshal now, and he never trusted you even back then. Maybe they do know, and they’ll just bring you right back to where you just escaped. 

They _know_. They have to know. They would have come for you otherwise. Charge - Ortega - would have. 

Unless he really thinks you died. What if he really thinks you died?

Yeah, so what? What are you even supposed to do then? Ask for help? 

You can’t do that without telling him the truth, and then it’s all the same anyway. Maybe he thinks you’re dead, maybe a day doesn’t go by without him missing you - but that just because he doesn’t _know_. 

You feel the bitterness churning in your gut like spoiled milk. You can’t ask him for anything without explaining, not looking like this, barely being able to talk; body ruined and mind... Yeah. 

Why do you even believe what he says to some reporter? Of course he’s going to do everything he can to appear sympathetic. _Ohh, I lost my best friend, don’t you feel sorry for me?_

It’s a show. It was always a show. 

So what are you doing here? 

Walk _away_. 

But your feet don’t obey you. You stay, as morning turns to midday turns to afternoon. People don’t pay attention to you - you don’t let them. The headquarter is busy; people coming and going. Staff, visitors, gawkers. No one you recognize. No Steel. No Charge. 

Maybe they have a private entry nowadays. Maybe they just come in through the garage. 

You should just leave. 

It’s early evening when finally you catch a whiff of a thought that sets your heart racing. Someone one is thinking about him - about Charge - about how they can’t believe--

Two figures exit the building. A young man, fair-skinned, blonde hair - even from the other side of the street you can see a pretty smile; broad shoulders; narrow hips. He’s dressed in tight clothing that shows off his figure and his mind is beaming; he’s happy, he’s proud, he’s excited. He can’t believe that he’s here, that he’s walking home from the Rangers’ headquarters because he works there, because he’s one of them, because Charge - _he asked you to call him by his name, asked you to call him Ortega, like you’re friends, maybe you can be because he seems to actually be really nice oh Jesus_ \- asked if he wanted to come along for some drinks and of course he said yes, because he’s dreamed about this and it’s actually happening-- 

The young man’s mind is loud enough that you can hear it in perfect clarity from where you stand on the opposite side of the street. A perfect contrast to one right next to him. Where there’s nothing. A buzz, if you focus really hard. 

And you do. 

Skipping down the stairs now, ginning at his companion, hands in his pockets, squinting because the setting sun is right in his eyes. He’s wearing slacks and a bright shirt that he hasn’t buttoned up properly, because of course he wouldn’t, and when he laughs you can _hear_ it and it hits you like you like concrete pavement. 

Like no time has passed at all. 

Except that five years ago, he would have been going out for drinks with _you_. 

You might as well be looking at reflection of yourself; the kid whose name you don’t know is so flattered, so charmed by fucking Ricardo Ortega - because that’s what he does, isn’t it? So fucking charming. That kid could be you - except your smile was never that bright, you were never that pretty, you couldn’t even wear a fucking t-shirt, and look at you _now_. 

What kind of delusion made you think you were _special_? 

That there was something special about the two of you. You know better, and still - a throwaway sentence in a fucking _gossip journal_ and you’d started to hope again. There was never anything but your own fucking stupidity - you were never more than that kid - _less_ \- you were never even human. 

Was it because he’d never kissed a man before, that you thought maybe he cared more for you than all those women? Idiot. It was never more than a game - a distraction, something to pass the time - and you knew it, you’d known it then, you know it now, you can feel the way that boy’s stomach is fluttering and you know exactly how it feels. When he smiles at you like there’s no one else in the room. When he moves up closer - throws his arm over your shoulders like _that_ \-- 

You turn and walk the opposite direction. As fast as you can; far, far to slow, on your shaking legs and swollen feet. 

Fuck, what if you’d actually tried to talk to him. 

_Fuck_. 

You have to stop being so stupid. 

So _stupid_. 

You ball your hands into fists and clench your teeth together. You were never friends. You were never anything else either - and you almost gave yourself up because you let yourself think that he might care, that maybe he meant what he said to some reporter to make himself look good. 

Because maybe he might _miss you_. 

Why _would_ he? There are a million better versions of you out there; maybe that kid will end up in bed with him before morning and then he’ll have gotten more out of _that_ relationship than from five years with you and _you thought that you were special_. 

No one misses you. 

No one cares.

Unless you _make_ them care. 

The other people on the sidewalk give you a wide berth, and you don’t care why. 

You hate all of them.

**Author's Note:**

> One of my favorite aspects of Fallen Hero is how you have to decide Sidesteps motivations and driving forces before you really know the cause of them. IMO, it's not just cool as a cause of mystery and suspense, but for me it just makes a character come alive in a way that they don't if you just react to things. AND it made me write words upon words upon words trying to figure those motivations - and I gathered up my courage to share some of them.


End file.
